Amending Protocol to the Free Trade Agreement between the Government of the People's Republic of China and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan (hereinafter referred to as the "Protocol") enters into force on December 1, 2019.
This revision of the China-Pakistan Free Trade Agreement is an important measure to implement the consensus of the leaders of the two countries and further enrich China-Pakistan's all-weather strategic cooperative partnership. It is a vivid practice of advancing the construction of the Belt and Road Initiative, a community of a shared future for mankind and a model for the construction of a free trade zone among developing countries. It is a concrete action to implement the UN's consensus on South-South cooperation, which will promote the level of trade liberalization and facilitation, and deepen bilateral economic and trade cooperation.
The Protocol upgrades and revises the contents of the original free trade agreement on market access and tariff reduction schedules, rules of origin, trade remedies, and investment. And it adds a new chapter on customs cooperation. Among them, the core content is to substantially increase the level of liberalization of trade in goods on the basis of the original free trade agreement. The Protocol stipulates that the proportion of tariff lines with zero-tariff products between China and Pakistan will gradually increase from 35% to 75%. In addition, both parties will implement a 20% reduction in taxes on other products that account for 5% of their respective tax lines. After negotiations between China and Pakistan, the tariff reduction will be implemented as soon as possible after completing the necessary domestic procedures.
The China-Pakistan Free Trade Agreement was signed in November 2006 and came into effect in July 2007. In order to further improve the level of trade liberalization and facilitation between the two countries, China and Pakistan launched the second phase of FTA negotiations in March 2011, and concluded the negotiations in April 2019 and signed the Protocol.
